The nexus between youth empowerment programmes and youth unemployment reduction in Africa: Evidence from Botswana

Abstract

ABSTRACT Using findings from a study on ‘Understanding the dynamics of youth development and socio-economic empowerment: A study on social policy and strategic responses for improving youth employment in Botswana’, the author examines the nexus between youth empowerment programmes and youth employability in Botswana. The specific objectives were to explore how youth empowerment programmes can be modified to stave off youth unemployment, and to enhance the capacity of the government and private sector to design and implement programmes for promoting employment. The findings shed light that the policy implementers do not have adequate capacity to help the youth realise socio-economic empowerment. Several challenges have continued to affect the attempts to implement sustainable youth empowerment programmes. This paper recommends that there is need to involve the youth in policy formulation and implementation in order to achieve employability through youth programmes.